This is Love (So Stay)
by masruiiiik
Summary: Their (once bright) love followed him – a stitch in his heart that he'd rather forget. It began when they were kids and he was feeling small and hated as his family dumped him in a foreign school, and stretched throughout the years even as the (stupid, idiotic) silver haired man left for a war and forgot about the blue-eyed boy who loved him so. GinHiji. AU.
1. Prologue

**This is Love (So Stay)**

Prologue

"Katsura!" Hijikata called out as the smoke from the bazooka Okita had dangerously wielded blocked out his vision and covered the area under a dark blanket. The light streaming from the windows helped, however, and the Vice-Commander of the Shinsengumi covered the lower part of his face with the crook of his arm as his eyes flickered this way and that for any sign of the long-haired terrorist. His Shinsengumi underlings were tumbling around behind him, and Hijikata clicked his tongue on the roof of his mouth in annoyance. _Useless, the whole lot of 'em._

There was a sudden jerk of movement to the right of him, and Hijikata instantly brandished his sword and thrust it blindly yet with deathly precision at the flicker of life. The smoke began dissipating as his sword sliced through it with ease, and Hijikata wondered belatedly if it was a fellow Shinsengumi member, before brushing such thoughts away. If a Shinsengumi member was stupid enough to be lumbering through the debris and smoke, then he deserved seppuku anyways.

However, Hijikata was not prepared for his sword to clang loudly with what was clearly the outline of another sword through the visage of smoke.

"Wha-?" He muttered in confusion, before the other's sword thrust upwards, forcing Hijikata to leap away.

"Oi, oi, that wasn't very nice," a deep baritone voice rumbled in a lazy drawl, and Hijikata instantly froze at the sound as his mind pulled him towards thoughts of unmanageable silver hair and half-lidded red eyes. "What if you killed me, eh?"

Then, as if it were curtains being drawn, the smoke disappeared completely, showing a tall man draped in a white and blue yukata which wasn't even worn properly, curly hair the colour of clouds, and those dead fish eyes that had lingered in the back of Hijikata's mind for the past ten years.

The waves of his malice lapped halfheartedly along the shores of betrayal and loneliness, and Hijikata gritted his teeth as his hands tightened on his sword. The banks of old friendship (and something else, something _more_ that he truly ever regretted giving to the natural perm) gnawed at his heart which was inexplicably lodged in his throat, and he pushed the warmth away and instead focused on the hatred thrumming through his veins.

Across from him, the silver haired man's eyes widened and his mouth twisted in the oddest way. Hijikata, however, refused to dwell on how big of a contrast the man in front of him differed from the boy in his memories, and he snarled out a name which he promised to never utter again all those years ago.

"Gintoki."

Gintoki's arms lowered, his wooden sword bumping harmlessly against his right leg and his eyes flickered up and down the darker haired male's body, taking in the Shinsengumi uniform and the tension rolling throughout his entire frame, and opened his mouth to speak. However, before any sound could be spoken (or even worse, Hijikata's _name_), the Vice-Commander had already leaped forwards, sword drawn with the blade glinting dangerously, his face twisted in a pained grimace as he aimed for Gintoki's heart, with the intent to kill.

-x-

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**A/N:** The title of this story is from the song, "Hospital" by Lydia. Lovely, lovely song that (sort of?) inspired this fic. This story is an AU so sorry of any confusion this prologue may have caused. Hopefully, you enjoyed this so far, and perhaps you will stay around to read the rest of this story? :)

Review please?

Until next time!

-masruiiiik


	2. Sleeping With This Silence In My Mind

Chapter 1: Sleeping With This Silence In My Mind

"Hello, hello," with a light touch to the top of his head was the first thing he received from the man (_Shoyo-sensei_) that was to be his caretaker and teacher. Hijikata had instantly shied away, unused to the foreign contact and began glancing around at their surroundings, making sure that his eyes land on anything and everything but the long haired man in front of him. His newfound teacher seemed to understand his hesitance quite clearly enough, and simply let out a small chortle before walking ahead, gesturing for the black-headed child to follow him. Hijikata gave a grateful huff of air before trailing after Shoyo slowly.

They passed by what seemed like a sleeping quarters and a dining area, before reaching a room with open doors. Hijikata looked in carefully to see a classroom filled with small tables and books with the smell of ink permeating the air. It was empty, however, and he pulled back to glance at Shoyo questioningly.

"Everyone's having a break right now," was his answer, "they're all playing in the courtyard. Would you like to join them?" Hijikata balked at the prospect, but Shoyo brushed away his fears with a kind smile before ushering him to the source of the sounds of laughter and loud voices.

Rounding a corner, Hijikata was met with an open area where around thirty children were running around and screaming and shouting laughter-laced words at each other. Suddenly feeling shy, Hijikata backed away a tiny bit before he was stopped by his teacher. Looking up, Shoyo just smiled down at him before leading his to the porch that was connected with the courtyard. "If you don't feel like playing, why don't you just sit here and enjoy the nice spring air? The sakura blossoms will bloom soon, see?" Kneeling next to Hijikata, Shoyo pointed towards one of the sakura trees located in the courtyard. The pink buds seemed ready to pop open any day now and Hijikata nodded in agreement.

Shoyo smiled one last time at Hijikata, before standing up and touching the top of his student's head. Hijikata didn't shy away his time, and Shoyo's eyes twinkled just a tiny bit at this happening. "I need to get you a new yukata," Shoyo said as he walked away, "just enjoy the open air as I find one for you."

Suddenly realizing just how dirty his clothes (and most probably the rest of his countenance) were, Hijikata curled up on himself a bit, pulling his legs towards his chest in hopes of making himself smaller to avoid getting any attention from the other children. He allowed his eyes to flicker to the rest of his classmates and noticed how happy they all seemed. Hijikata's lips quirked up just a tiny bit and he allowed himself to relax slightly, until a presence made themselves known beside him.

"Who are you?" asked a distinctly male voice, and Hijikata jerked back before looking back up and seeing three kids who looked a bit older than him staring at him. The speaker was a boy with curly _silver_ hair and Hijikata couldn't help but stare at it in slight shock and awe.

"What Gintoki meant to say," the boy with the ponytail said, attempting to be discreet as he poked _Gintoki_ none too gently on the side, "was: Hello. Who are you?"

"That's not much better, Zura." The third boy, one with purple tinted hair stated, clicking his tongue while rolling his eyes at his friend's antics as an all out poking war began beside him.

"It's not Zura, it's Katsura!" Katsura cried out before yelping as Gintoki bent him down and gave him a noogie. Hijikata just stared in stunned silence and Takasugi waved away such claims with an easy hand. He rolled his eyes once more as Gintoki and Katsura ceased their fighting, and Hijikata concluded that this boy seemed to always carry around an air of exasperation and annoyance.

"Ignore them. I'm Takasugi Shinsuke, the long-haired moron is Zura Kotaro ("Katsura! It's Katsura!), and the old man is Sakata Gintoki." Sakata blew Takasugi a raspberry and Hijikata just nodded dumbly. After a moment in which Hijikata just stared at the three hooligans in front of him blankly, Takasugi snapped his fingers in front of his face.

Hijikata jerked back and stumbled over his words before offering a quiet, "Hello?"

Takasugi rolled his eyes _again_ and Hijikata briefly entertained the thought of the other boy's eyes being stuck at the top of his head permanently. "Your name please?"

"Oh," Hijikata murmured, somewhat embarrassed. "I'm Hijikata Toushiro."

"Nice to meet you!" Katsura chirped. "Are you a new student here?"

"Um…yes."

"Oh…so you're going to be staying with us from now on." Katsura nodded sagely.

"How old are you?" Takasugi questioned next as he sized up the boy in front of him.

"I'm ten." Hijikata responded shyly at all the questions being thrown his way.

"So you're three years younger than us. I was wondering why you look so tiny." Takasugi said brazenly, and Katsura stepped on his toes to which he yelped: "Jeez! What the heck, Zura?!"

"Are you going to be staying with us for the full year or just part year?" Katsura asked kindly while Takasugi proceeded to jump up and down with Gintoki chuckling madly at him. The whole situation seemed crazy and impossible, and Hijikata suddenly felt as if his tongue was bloated in his mouth. In a foreign place surrounded by foreign people with three strange _upperclassmen_ (really…) questioning him, it was just too strange a feeling.

However, Hijikata batted down the feelings blanketing over his form and instead focused on answering the interrogation being thrown his way. "Full year…"

"Oh…" Katsura uttered quietly, shooting a look at both Takasugi and Sakata. The curly haired boy ignored his friend's prominent glance and instead stared disconcertingly at the youngest among the four with a look that seemed to strip Hijikata of all his layers. "So…you don't have a…family?"

It was hesitantly spoken, and quiet and kind and free of malice, and yet Hijikata still ashamedly found tears welling up in his eyes and blurring out his vision. Thoughts of loneliness and being unwanted invaded his mind, and he furrowed deeper within himself, bringing his head between his knees to avoid the looks of disgust surely being thrown his way by his upperclassmen. There was a rustle of movement and frantic words being thrown about, but Hijikata could barely make out what was being spoken much less by whom and to whom. His senses were on an overdrive and it was with a tired hiccup that he found himself carefully lifted up. Looking up from over a warm shoulder (_Shoyo-sensei's shoulder_, his mind supplied helpfully), Hijikata made out three coloured blobs moving about with choppy movements before he allowed his eyes to close and succumbed to his exhaustion.

He woke up in what felt like a few minutes later in a clean yukata. Blearily blinking about, he found himself in the sleeping quarters, all tucked in a fresh-smelling futon. Shoyo was standing at the doorway, about to step out and slide the shoji door shut, but he turned around at the sound of Hijikata moving about. Seeing that the young child was half awake and staring at him with bleary confusion, the long haired teacher smiled gently at his new ward.

"Just sleep for now," Shoyo said, and Hijikata attempted to nod but simply buried deeper within the warm blankets cocooning him. "You can begin your lessons tomorrow. For now, just rest. I'll wake you when it's time for supper."

The door slid shut silently, and the last ray of sunlight that had been streaming into the room became muffled. Hijikata closed his eyes gratefully before thoughts of Sakata, Katsura and Takasugi invaded his mind. He winced and decided to apologize to them later tonight during dinner.

But for now, he allowed sleep's bittersweet warmth to embrace him, and fell into a dark abyss filled with disconnected thoughts and visions that never made much sense to him.

It was a blessed distraction. 


	3. Getting Busy Doing Nothing

Chapter 2: Getting Busy Doing Nothing

"Thank you for the yukata…Shoyo-sensei." Hijikata said as he walked next to his teacher towards the dining room. After Shoyo had woken Hijikata up from his slumber a good few hours later, Hijikata finally got a good look at his yukata. It was made of a simple black material, tied together by a grey obi, and Hijikata tugged on its ends gratefully. Shoyo had gestured for Hijikata to follow him out to where supper was being served, all the while smiling amicably and speaking in kind tones to the young boy. Hijikata himself had been content at simply listening to his teacher explain the schedule for the day, when breakfast was served, when classes started and the such, and had entertained the thought of reaching out to grasp the hand of the man who had treated him extremely kindly since his arrival.

Finally plucking the courage, Hijikata had quickly reached for the other's hand before grasping it with upmost determination. There was a slight pause in Shoyo's speech, before Hijikata felt his hand being squeezed and they continued walking forwards.

That warmth had been very nice, Hijikata had decided as he stared around from his seat at a low table. Kids (all of them seemingly older than him) were scattered around the table, all digging heartily into their meals of white rice, miso soup, and mackerel with glasses of milk, while speaking in happy, fast tones to their friends. Hijikata poked sullenly at his fish, feeling rather alone, before taking a big bite out of it. He continued eating without pause, pretending to be caught up in his dinner in order to avoid eye contact with anyone.

"Hello." A sudden voice spoke up, but Hijikata continued to eat, believing the person to be speaking to someone else, until the voice repeated again, "Hello."

Looking up, Hijikata clumsily dropped the piece of mackerel he had been holding with his chopsticks, and with a blush staining his cheeks attempted to discreetly pick it back up. Sakata continued watching this with bored eyes until Hijikata managed to brush the dropped piece of fish back into his bowl and looked up before giving a light nod and turning back towards his meal.

After a brief pause, Sakata spoke up again. "I'm sorry Zura made you cry. He's always like that. Super careless."

"Ah…no," Hijikata put down his bowl and decided he was full anyways. "I'm sorry for crying in front of you, Sakata-san."

"Just Gintoki is fine," Sakata…_Gintoki_ said with a careless shrug of his shoulders. "If you call me Sakata-san, I'm really gonna feel like an old man." He proceeded to pick his nose out in the open, and Hijikata stared at him blankly before nodding.

"Okay then. I'm sorry for crying in front of you, Gintoki…"

Finished picking his nose, Gintoki flicked the remnants into the wild yonder, and said simply, "Don't be. But if it makes you feel any better, I don't have a family either."

"Oh. Sorry." Hijikata offered, deciding there was absolutely no need to clarify to the older boy that it wasn't so much that he didn't have a family, but that they simply didn't want him. Gintoki watched him with strangely blank eyes before shrugging and standing up. Walking around the table, he tugged at Hijikata's arm until the younger boy stood up. Hijikata started as Gintoki began dragging him from the dining room and stared in confusion at the back of his ridiculously curly hair.

"Wait, Gintoki, where–?"

"I have something that'll make you feel better," was the simply response and Hijikata's eyes squinted in confusion before staring back at the half-eaten dinner that they left behind.

"But I didn't clean—"

"Someone else will do it," Gintoki interrupted indifferently and Hijikata gaped at him. "This is more important."

They walked through winding corridors and the chattering of conversations and laughter with light drifted further and further away the deeper they walked. Hijikata didn't even notice how late it probably already was until he noticed the shadows dancing in the darkened halls. Unconsciously, the younger boy tightened his grasp on the other's hand, and jolted when Gintoki simply squeezed it back in return.

"Scared?" Gintoki's taunting voice seemed to bounce around in the halls, and Hijikata's eyes narrowed before he puffed out his chest as much as he could (not that it made much of a difference as the perm-head wasn't looking at him).

"No. Why would I be?"

"No reason," Gintoki sang back nonchalantly, "just that your hand's beginning to sweat."

Hijikata flinched just a tiny bit before he yelped indignantly, "It is not!"

Gintoki, however, had stopped and didn't answer him. Pulling open the shoji doors before him, the older boy entered the room with Hijikata trailing cautiously behind him. The room was bathed in a silvery glow caused by the moon, and the black-haired boy stared entranced as Gintoki's hair seemed to glow under the natural light, much like an ethereal being. So focused he was on the other's strange hair, that Hijikata didn't even notice the cardboard box sitting before him till he was bent halfway over it.

"How the heck did you not notice that?" Gintoki asked from across the room, where he was shuffling through another cardboard box with the words, 'Sakata Gintoki's Stuff' scrawled messily on the side. Hijikata huffed and pushed himself up, his knees stinging a bit from the fall, but nothing he hadn't experienced before.

"What're you doing?" He asked and Gintoki spared him a split-second glance before looking back down.

"I'm looking for something."

"Looking for what?"

"Looking for something that'll make you feel better."

"I'm already feeling better." Hijikata answered truthfully, and while Gintoki didn't look up this time, the younger noticed a silver eyebrow arching in question.

"Are you a masochist or something? It's alright if you are," Gintoki nodded sagely. "I think Zura is one. And I think I'm beginning to think that I'm a super sadist. The other day, I ate some mochi in front of Takasugi and I didn't share. It made me feel important. Super sadistic, right?"

Hijikata pondered over that long and hard as the rifling sounds continued. Finally, he asked, "What's a masochist and a sadist?"

Gintoki shook his head. "Never mind, it's not important. Ah-ha!" He yelled out in triumph, and Hijikata walked slowly towards him, carefully avoiding all boxes strewn recklessly around the small area. Gintoki quickly pulled down the younger boy once Hijikata reached his side before shoving a book into his face. Pulling it away from his face and carefully holding it with his hands, Hijikata blinked slowly at the colourful pictures and words depicted on the cover.

"What's this?" Hijikata asked in bewildered wonderment, already enraptured by the happy drawings and the bold words that seemed to almost pop from the page. Gintoki's chest puffed up in pride and he traced a giddy finger over the spine of the magazine. Hijikata pushed it back towards the older boy, assuming he wanted it back, but Gintoki simply shook his head and pushed it back to Hijikata.

"It's a JUMP magazine," Gintoki explained patiently, and Hijikata clutched it to his chest even though he didn't understand what it actually was. "It has tons and tons of manga chapter in there, and there's new JUMP magazines that come out every week. I only have three issues because it's super hard to get your hands on them. That one's the first JUMP I've ever gotten – it's from Shoyo-sensei."

Hijikata's hands faltered in fear of damaging such a priceless gift, but Gintoki shrugged apathetically. "I've already read that one hundreds of times," the silver-haired boy stated, "so you can have it. But make sure you take good care of it. JUMP is the second best thing in the world…after sweets. No wait, third thing in the world…after sweets and Shoyo-sensei. Yep."

There was a silence where Hijikata just stared at his new possession in awe.

Gintoki nudged his pointedly. "Go on and read it. I'll tell you all my favourites."

And that was when Hijikata decided that though Shoyo-sensei was nice and sweet, Gintoki was probably his new favourite person in the world.

He cracked open the magazine with its yellowed pages and stains caused by food and tea and all other things ("Stained with love," Gintoki said simply), and proceeded to attempt to understand the world his new favourite person seemed to be so absolutely infatuated with.

Shoyo found them later that night, much past their bedtime with everyone else already tucked in, inside the storage room, surrounded by boxes and leaning against each other. Shoyo chuckled in faint amusement even though he knew he should be reprimanding them as he caught sight of the beloved magazine connecting them.

Meanwhile, Hijikata was lost in ridiculous dreams involving ninjas and orange jumpsuits – he hadn't slept so well in quite a while.

Or woken up feeling so harassed and disturbed before.

-x-

**Chapter title from the song 'Busy' by Olly Murs.**

Hope you enjoyed, leave a review if you so please! They make me happy! ;)

See you next time!

-masruiiiik


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